World Biodiversity Day: TEEB study leader emphasizes urgent need for action on biodiversity loss

Helmholtz Association of German Research Centres EurekAlert 22 May 10;

New York, 21 May 2010 - Activities taking place around the world on the hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme with financial support from the European Commission; Germany, UK, Norway, Netherlands and Sweden [Saturday 22 May] reflect the growing recognition of the importance of biodiversity to all human well-being and for sustaining the ecosystems we all depend upon.

The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) study leader, Pavan Sukhdev says that the day should act as a catalyst for galvanising action to prevent further loss of biodiversity.

'We can and must bring vigorous new thinking to the table to help undo the ongoing damage to our planet's biodiversity' Pavan Sukhdev commented from UNEP New York today.

Awareness of the importance of biodiversity is rising on government and business agendas. There is increasing evidence and understanding about what is being lost in terms of biodiversity, its impacts on the functioning of ecosystems and actions that can be taken to prevent continuing losses.

Hosted by the United Nations Environment Programme, The TEEB study is undertaking an extensive review of the science and economics of ecosystems and biodiversity. By synthesising these different disciplines the study is providing clear recommendations and practical steps forward for addressing biodiversity loss.

The economic case for biodiversity provides compelling motivation for the need to urgently address policy and business practice moving forward. TEEB estimated that the Net Present Value (NPV) of annual Natural Capital loss as a result of forest loss is between EUR 1.35 trillion - EUR 3.1 trillion (US$ 2.0 trillion – US$ 4.5 trillion). In September last year TEEB highlighted the coral reef crisis, an ecosystem at a tipping point and one that provides significant human welfare benefits (fisheries, shoreline protection, tourism, recreation and aesthetic value) estimated to be valued as much as US$ 172 billion annually. Within the TEEB reports there are many more examples of the economic argument for conservation and ecological restoration.

Pavan Sukhdev continues: 'Biodiversity Day reminds us that we are only five months away from the Convention on Biological Diversity's COP10 meeting in Nagoya. We must all work towards making the meeting in Nagoya a decisive moment in history. One in which, by recognising the social, economic and ethical dimension of biodiversity loss, political and business leaders take practical steps forward to prevent the continued degradation of our environment and the resulting impacts on human well being.'

The TEEB for Policy Makers report released in November 2009 called for governments to reform and enhance national accounting systems to incorporate the value of Natural Capital; to establish payments for ecosystem services, to reform environmentally harmful subsidies and to invest in ecological restoration.

In July TEEB will release its report for business at the first Global Business of Biodiversity Symposium, taking place in London on 13 and 14 July. In September the TEEB for Local and Regional Policy report will be released. Final findings of the TEEB study will be released at the CBD COP10 meeting in Nagoya in October 2010.

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Further information on TEEB can be found at www.teebweb.org

World Celebrates International Day for Biological Diversity
UNEP 22 May 10;

2010 Theme: Biodiversity, Development and Poverty Alleviation

On 22 May 2010, the world celebrates the International Day for Biological Diversity (IBD) under the theme 'Biodiversity, Development and Poverty Alleviation'.

The International Day for Biological Diversity will be celebrated in 11 countries around the world – from Tunisia to the Philippines and from India to the United Kingdom.

This year's event is a unique opportunity to raise public awareness on the importance of biodiversity for sustainable development and the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals.

The theme is particularly relevant in this 2010 International Year of Biodiversity – the target year for the 2010 Biodiversity Target.

In 2002, Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity committed to achieve by 2010 a significant reduction of the current rate of biodiversity loss as a contribution to poverty alleviation and to the benefit of all life on Earth.

The 2010 Biodiversity Target was later incorporated as a new target under Goal 7 of the MDGs (to 'Ensure environmental sustainability').

However, a report by UNEP researchers published on 29 April showed that the 2010 target has not been achieved, and that world leaders have instead overseen an alarming decline in biodiversity since 1970.

The report, published in the leading journal Science, says biodiversity is still being lost as fast as ever and that the pressures on species, habitats and ecosystems are continuing to increase.

Indeed, since 1970 animal populations have reduced by 30 per cent, the area of mangroves and sea grasses by 20 per cent and the coverage of living corals by 40 per cent.

The findings are the first assessment of how the targets made through the 2002 Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) have not been met, and are an alarm call about the urgency of taking action for biodiversity.

Protecting biodiversity is the basis of human well-being, yet biodiversity is being threatened by development choices that ignore its full value to us all, and particularly to the poorest. Reversing this negative trend is not only possible, but essential to human well-being.

Global responses to biodiversity loss and the strategies for its conservation need to be reinforced and re-tooled to reverse the current trend of continued loss.

The conservation, sustainable use, and equitable sharing of the benefits of biodiversity require integration across policy reforms and institutional strengthening.

Country leadership and increased support from development cooperation are critical for the implementation of the Convention on Biological Diversity.

UN says case for saving species 'more powerful than climate change'
Goods and services from the natural world should be factored into the global economic system, says UN biodiversity report
Juliette Jowit guardian.co.uk 21 May 10;

The economic case for global action to stop the destruction of the natural world is even more powerful than the argument for tackling climate change, a major report for the United Nations will declare this summer.

The Stern report on climate change, which was prepared for the UK Treasury and published in 2007, famously claimed that the cost of limiting climate change would be around 1%-2% of annual global wealth, but the longer-term economic benefits would be 5-20 times that figure.

The UN's biodiversity report – dubbed the Stern for Nature – is expected to say that the value of saving "natural goods and services", such as pollination, medicines, fertile soils, clean air and water, will be even higher – between 10 and 100 times the cost of saving the habitats and species which provide them.

To mark the UN's International Day for Biological Diversity tomorrow, hundreds of British companies, charities and other organisations have backed an open letter from the Natural History Museum's director Michael Dixon warning that "the diversity of life, so crucial to our security, health, wealth and wellbeing is being eroded".

The UN report's authors go further with their warning on biodiversity, by saying if the goods and services provided by the natural world are not valued and factored into the global economic system, the environment will become more fragile and less resilient to shocks, risking human lives, livelihoods and the global economy.

"We need a sea-change in human thinking and attitudes towards nature: not as something to be vanquished, conquered, but rather something to be cherished and lived within," said the report's author, the economist Pavan Sukhdev.

The changes will involve a wholesale revolution in the way humans do business, consume, and think about their lives, Sukhdev, told The Guardian. He referred to the damage currently being inflicted on the natural world as "a landscape of market failures".

The report will advocate massive changes to the way the global economy is run so that it factors in the value of the natural world. In future, it says, communities should be paid for conserving nature rather than using it; companies given stricter limits on what they can take from the environment and fined or taxed more to limit over-exploitation; subsidies worth more than US$1tn (£696.5bn) a year for industries like agriculture, fisheries, energy and transport reformed; and businesses and national governments asked to publish accounts for their use of natural and human capital alongside their financial results.

And the potential economic benefits are huge. Setting up and running a comprehensive network of protected areas would cost $45bn a year globally, according to one estimate, but the benefits of preserving the species richness within these zones would be worth $4-5tn a year.

The report follows a series of recent studies showing that the world is in the grip of a mass extinction event as pollution, climate change, development and hunting destroys habitats of all types, from rainforests and wetlands to coastal mangroves and open heathland. However, only two of the world's 100 biggest companies believe reducing biodiversity is a strategic threat to their business, according to another report released tomorrow by PricewaterhouseCoopers, which is advising the team compiling the UN report.

"Sometimes people describe Earth's economy as a spaceship economy because we are basically isolated, we do have limits to how much we can extract, and why and where," said Sukhdev, who visited the UK WHEN as a guest of science research and education charity, the Earthwatch Institute..

The TEEB report shows that on average one third of Earth's habitats have been damaged by humans – but the problem ranges from zero percent of ice, rock and polar lands to 85% of seas and oceans and more than 70% of Mediterranean shrubland. It also warns that in spite of growing awareness of the dangers, destruction of nature will "still continue on a large scale". The International Union for the Conservation of Nature has previously estimated that species are becoming extinct at a rate 1,000 and 10,000 times higher than it would naturally be without humans.